Now that the Health and Social Care Bill is the Health and Social Care Act, more focus will be placed on sources of information regarding provider performance. In order for patients to make informed choices… Read More »Making conclusions about provider quality
In the health economics literature we often treat a hospital as a healthcare producing ‘firm’. We define cost-functions and perform efficiency analysis, for example. However, this sort of analysis is certainly hampered by the difficulty… Read More »Human capital, endogenous growth and hospital performance
Here in the UK, NICE sometimes advises against the provision of particular drugs, by the NHS, on the grounds that evidence does not indicate them to be cost-effective. In some cases it appears that these… Read More »Rationing and deprivation in risk sharing schemes
Can we reasonably consider ‘doing nothing’ as an alternative course of action? In many cost-effectiveness analyses the intervention under consideration is compared against a ‘doing nothing’ scenario, although frequently the next best alternative is used.… Read More »The ethics of doing nothing